


To Lie Next to You is to Go Home

by RuthlesslyEfficient



Category: Anne of Green Gables (TV 1985) & Related Fandoms
Genre: Anne and Gil go home, Anne of Green Gables: The Continuing Story - Freeform, F/M, Metaphorical dreams, Reference to but no graphic description of sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-15
Updated: 2018-04-15
Packaged: 2019-04-23 00:06:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,226
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14320041
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RuthlesslyEfficient/pseuds/RuthlesslyEfficient
Summary: "Gil wakes warm and the bed beneath him is comfortable; he can't remember the last time he woke to that. Instead of the acrid stink of smoke, he smells the scent of rosewater that always seemed to cling to Anne's hair. Then she's there, the bed dipping as she leans over him, her braid falling over her shoulder."'Gil,' she says, 'I'm here.'"Anne and Gil are finally back together. They're finally going home.





	To Lie Next to You is to Go Home

The cabin door shuts behind Anne and Gil, enclosing them in the small stateroom that will be theirs until they arrive in New York. Anne takes off her hat and sets it on the little table in the corner, then busies herself setting out their small meal -- sandwiches, a little thermos of broth, and water. She hears the thunk of a deadbolt and then the jangle of a chain as Gilbert locks them in securely, then the creak of the bed as he sits on it and the release of a tired sigh. 

She turns around to look at him and finds him bent forward with his elbows on his knees. His head, still adorned with his hat, hangs down. She has never seen him so weary. She moves to stand in front of him. Gently removing his hat and setting it on the bed beside him, she runs her fingers through his hair. He rests his forehead against her stomach and his hands on the outside of her legs. He inhales deeply, then lets out another sigh, this one a little more relaxed. 

They stay like that for several long minutes, her carding her fingers through his dark hair, now slightly grey at the temples; him clutching the worn cotton of her shift dress. 

"I missed you," she says finally. "I was scared for you every second, every day for years."

"I'm sorry," he breathes. Slowly, he lifts his head and then tilts it back to look at up her. She frames the sides of his head, entranced by the sight of her small, pale fingers against his tanned skin, drinking in his beloved face. "Did I ruin us, Anne?" he asks, sounding like a child. "God, did I ruin us?"

A frown creases her brow. "What are you talking about?"

"I left you to fight this goddamned war," he says. "I left to work at the hospital. I left for school. Why did I do that?" he asks her, his tone increasingly desperate, his voice catching. She's never seen him so distraught, not even when she rejected his first proposal. "Why did I keep leaving when you're the only thing I've ever really wanted since I was 16?"

"Shhh," she soothes, sliding down into his lap, massaging her fingertips over the nape of his neck. He drops his head to the curve of her neck. "It's all right. We thought there was time. There is time, Gil. We still have so much time. Everything's going to be all right. We're together again."

"I am never leaving you again," he swears with vehemence into her warm flesh. That's new, too, she thinks. She can recall him earnest, but never vehement.

She nuzzles in to him, urging his head up to press her mouth to his in soft, brief kisses. Like they always do, like they always have, the kisses soon become not so soft and not so brief. Finally, his breathing ragged, he pulls his mouth away and rests his forehead against hers. 

"The mind is willing, but I'm afraid the body is still too weak," he says with a self-deprecating grin that would be charming if it weren't just a little too bitter. 

"No matter," she says, and finds she means it even though this it the first time they've been safe enough to really even consider it. "It'll be good to have you lying beside me again. Now," she turns businesslike as she rises and his fingers reluctantly release her, "we should eat." She hands him the broth. "You drink all of that," she orders, her tone the same as the bossy little girl he'd first met all those years ago.

"Yes, ma'am," he says, and this time his smile is real. 

\-------

After they've finished munching their sandwiches, she collects the single carpet bag they're traveling with. They brave the corridor again to find the small communal bath a few doors down. He locks the door again as she gets a bar of soap from the bag. Tomorrow, he thinks to himself as he sits in a small wooden chair near the tub, he'll have to rustle up a razor. 

She kneels before him and starts to unlace his boots, shooing his tired, clumsy fingers away when he reaches to help. She tugs them off one by one, and his socks, too, pleased to see his feet don't look as bad as some of the soldiers she had seen fresh from trenches. In the meantime, he has managed to loose the knot of his tie and started to unbuckle his Sam Browne. She helps with his buttons and together they pull his jacket off. They remove his shirt in the same manner. She orders him to fill the bath while she starts to work off her clothes. 

They bathe together. It's too quick and efficient to be sensual. He has the distant thought that they should do this again when they're home and have all the time and privacy they want. 

When they're done, she hands him a pair of soft cotton pants and a plain white shirt to sleep in. He pulls them on while she dons her nightgown. 

Clean and freshly attired, they return to the stateroom and prepare to climb into the little bed. As they turn down the covers, Gil is fighting to keep his eyes open. It seems now he knows they're safe, his body is demanding he yield to years of exhaustion. He nudges Anne toward the side farthest from the door and then slides in next to her. They lie awkwardly side-by-side on their backs for a moment. It's been so long, after all, since they were alone together in bed. Finally, she turns onto her side, her back to him, and looks over her shoulder. "Well?" she demands. He grins and tucks himself in behind her, wrapping his arms around her snugly and burying his nose against the back of her neck. 

She feels him take a deep breath and let it out, and all the tension leaves his body. He's asleep the next moment. With the weight of his arm over her and the warmth of his breath on her skin, it doesn't take her long to follow him. 

\-----

Gil dreams of Green Gables. It's a dream he's had many times since he left for war. 

He's walking along the lane at dawn. He's not tired, nor is he anxious. He's not rushing but not strolling, either.

He's in uniform and carrying his pack. He's not wearing his boots, but it does not seem strange to him to be barefoot. Beneath his toes, the grass is cool and wet with dew. The ground is soft.

As he crests a small hill, Green Gables comes into view in front of him. It's like watching the sun emerge from over the horizon. It was still in need of repairs when he left, but in his dream, it’s just as it was when he was a boy. The siding is unblemished and the green accents are bright from careful tending. It glows, idyllic. 

The smell of apples wafts toward him on a gentle breeze. The trees whisper with the wind. He could look up at the branches rippling, but his gaze is fixed on the white picket fence, the emerald shutters, the orange glare of daybreak reflected off the windows. 

As he gets closer, he can make out a figure on the front porch bench. A glint of sunlight on red hair is evidence it's Anne, but he knew that already. She's wearing her hair up in the bun she favored when they were young and a white blouse with a high lace collar. He could call for her, drop his bag, sprint to her, but he doesn't. He just keeps striding toward her, bare feet purposeful. 

When he's nearly to the gate, he can hear her reading aloud from a book on her lap. He knows she's reciting poetry, but he can't tell precisely what. Then she looks up, sweeping her eyes out over the farm. As her gaze falls on him, she breaks into a smile, all soft pink lips and freckles across her nose and gray eyes. She sets her book aside and stands, but she does not cry his name and she does not run to meet him. She simply stands there on the porch, watching him come to her. Her long cream skirt and several loose tendrils of lovely copper hair flutter in the breeze. 

He opens the gate and closes it carefully behind him, hands rasping over the whitewashed wood. He's close enough now that he can see her feet, like his, are bare. They make no noise as she crosses a few steps to meet him at the stair to the porch. Still smiling serenely, she reaches out a hand for him. 

He starts to lift his arm. In previous iterations of the dream, he woke up before feeling her skin against his. Not so this time. He wraps his hand around hers. His pack is gone suddenly, freeing his other hand. Slowly, like he did all those years ago as they stood on the hill in the pasture against the setting sun, he places his fingertips against the delicate blush of her cheek. 

"Gil," she breathes. "My love." Her voice is like the soft grass under his heels, like the wind in the leaves, like the sunlight on the house, like the soundless sweep of her feet over the painted wooden porch. 

"Anne," he says, and he's finally home. 

\-----

Gil's eyes blink open to the sight of a black painted metal ceiling. The calm of his dream lingers for a moment before being brushed aside by disorientation. He's warm and the bed beneath him is comfortable; he can't remember the last time he woke to that. Instead of the acrid stink of smoke, he smells the scent of rosewater that always seemed to cling to Anne's hair. Then she's there, the bed dipping as she leans over him, her braid falling over her shoulder. 

"Gil," she says, "I'm here." 

The past couple of days come back to him. He reaches up. Gently, he runs that braid through his fingers, enjoying the feel of the silken strands bound tightly together. 

"You said my name," she says. 

"I was dreaming," he tells her, his voice a little raspy still with sleep. "I was dreaming of coming home to you." 

She smiles beatifically and lays more fully atop him. Her arms rest on either side of his head, her breasts press to his chest and his arms come around her waist. "We'll go home together," she says. He nods. She presses a few kisses to his brow and cheeks and he just lays there, basking in it. 

Finally, he asks, "How long have I slept?"

"It's nearly 10," she informs him, and his eyes widen in surprise. "I fetched some breakfast for when you're ready. It's just bread and milk, but it should do." 

"Thank you," he says, kisses her again, and rises.

\----

They take a walk around the deck after their breakfast, eat lunch in the dining room and then return to the stateroom, where Anne urges Gil down for a nap. He's only been up a few hours, but he doesn’t argue, which is a testament to his fatigue. 

When he wakes after a few more hours, he finds her sitting at the table and scribbling in a small book with a stubby pencil. He watches her silently for several minutes, enjoying how beautiful she is, before she notices he's awake again. She comes to him, smoothing his hair away from his forehead. He feels well-fed and finally rested; better than he has in months -- no, years. 

Her eyes are so pretty. 

"Anne," he says softly. Even though it's been so long and their time together before he left was so short, she knows exactly what he means. 

She stands and takes off her dress. 

\-----

After, she lay snuggled into his side. Gil had fallen asleep again nearly immediately, but she's not offended. 

She had found it hard to understand why she had difficulty sleeping without him. After all, they'd shared a bed only two nights before he left -- but even so, she could never lay down without thinking of how he should be next to her. 

Now, with his long, lean body pressed to hers and his stomach expanding with each steady, deep breath, she understands. It's the same way she had felt while she slept on hard pallets in a dozen homes that were not hers. It wasn't necessarily the absence of a familiar sensation, but rather disconcertion that things were not as they were meant to be. Longing. 

Anne wiggles around onto her back so she can see Gil's face. She studies that gray at his temples, notices a small, faded scar under his left eye and one near his hairline. She recognizes them as shrapnel wounds. Earlier, she had clung to his shoulders and felt how wiry his frame had become.

War had changed him. It had changed her, too. It had changed the world. 

And yet, she thinks as she squeezes the forearm across her middle and allows herself to relax, some things remained utterly the same. Some things were exactly as they should be.


End file.
